The Phantom Line
by NuthatchXi
Summary: "Brandon doesn't know why he can't stop feeling her touch, as though her eager hands have branded shame onto his very skin." In the wake of season 1, Brandon struggles to deal with the baggage of his night with Dani.


Disclaimer: I can only dream that I own anything, and I'm certainly not making any money off of this. I borrowed some dialogue from 2x05, 2x06, and 2x07.

**Warnings: (!) Dark themes, non-graphic references to the rape of a minor (!) Mild sexual references. Spoilers up to 2x07. **

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The discordant beeps of Brandon's alarm drag him from sleep, as effortlessly as magnets pulling steel.

His head pulses in phantom echo of the noise, a product of the worst hangover he's ever had. But the internal vibrations fail where the alarm has succeeded—his body is moving, but his mind remains strangely asleep. His memories of the previous day are shrouded in a haze of unreality. Only the physical world feels real. Brandon is disconcertingly conscious of the chill of air on his bare chest; of the way the crumpled silver sheets lie in curves meant to frame two bodies.

_Smooth lips, demanding, claiming his_.

The sensory memory jolts through his mind like a lightening bolt, laced with a guilt so sickening he can't breath. His mouth tingles oddly.

But his alarm is still beeping, so Brandon moves like an automaton to stop it, and for a few moments his mind feels dreamlike again.

He has a message from his dad.

Drunken, sad ramblings. Apologies, undeserved. The words creep into his skin, seeping through his very pores to join the pit of misery at his core. But it is nothing to the horror of realization.

Brandon's mouth trembles. He crossed so many lines to help his father, but he only drove him to drink in the end.

Worse, his dad is still missing. Panic surges. He has to get help. Taking a shuddering breath, he dials the only person who might be able to aid him.

The familiarity of Dani's recorded voice shatters his sense of distance.

_Hands, swift, yanking his shirt over his head. Desperation to feel something, anything, other than a disappointment. Physical pleasure, through a dizzying alcoholic fog._

He can't have slept with Dani.

What has he _done_?

These last few weeks, he has redefined failure. But there is no return from a betrayal like this.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Brandon's dreams are haunted by brutal fists and shattered fingers, and lying for what feels like forever, alone, in an agonized pool of his own blood. But the beating isn't what keeps him lying awake for hours. Nor is his fear about losing piano, though the very possibility of being unable to play classically has left him feeling as though the last remaining piece of Brandon Foster is crumbling into dust.

No. He imagines his dad's face, creased with hatred at the realization of his son's behavior. He thinks of long-nailed fingers, running almost roughly over the tender muscles of his arms.

Brandon doesn't know why he can't stop feeling her touch, as though her eager hands have branded shame onto his very skin.

He can't escape. There is no peace. There is not even refuge. He can't lose himself in music. He can't even avoid Dani, who is there, _always_ there, with her odd smile, and her eyes tracing the contours of his shirt, daring him to say anything. She corners him at school to tell him that she's moving in with his dad, and Brandon has never felt more lodged in a nightmare. Dani relates details he never wanted to know about the night his father fell off the wagon due to Brandon's mistakes, and somehow even more guilt manages to settle onto his shoulders. She tells him to just get over what happened, and Brandon hates her for it. But he hates himself more.

He spends all his time trying to forget, but he can do nothing but remember.

The worst part is, he doesn't even understand why he did it.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::

His father works late, leaving him alone with Dani for dinner, in the house where it happened—the mistake that now defines him.

"You don't have to worry. It's not like something's going to happen," Dani tells him, patronizing, when he announces he's leaving. Instantly he feels silly, childish, for trying to flee. As if he needs to _escape_. As if she were some sort of puppet master, capable of making him do things he didn't want to do.

"I know," Brandon snaps back, rebelling against the swell of humiliation without knowing why. Her eyes, her complacent, ever-present smile, have never bothered him more. "How can you do this?"

She lays out piping hot empanadas with an air of implacable composure. "Do what?"

"Move in with my dad, sleep next to him every night, knowing what we did?" Lashing out at her eases some of the swirling pressure inside him, but only barely. "I _hate _myself. I can barely look him in the eye!"

Finally she stops smiling. "Your dad and I were broken up."

"So that makes it okay, then." It's a challenge, and he has never stood up to her this much in one conversation.

"No. But I didn't cheat on him."

"I was _drunk_." Brandon doesn't know where this sudden defensiveness has sprung from. He knows, after all, that there was no excuse for what he did.

"You used me," she accuses, eyes growing wide, shining like lanterns of vulnerability. "You wanted to your dad for all the times he hurt you. You didn't screw me that night. You screwed him."

The words feel like barbs, hooking into his skin; a fishing line, reeling him into her sway. He can't stand to listen to this. In a burst of defiance, Brandon heads for the door, snarling, "You're so full of—"

"The truth?" Dani blocks his way. She's small, but Brandon stops in his tracks, feeling bizarrely trapped. All he has to do is walk past her—but for some reason he stays, paralyzed by her poisonous stream of words.

"I'm not the only one he'll never forgive."

Brandon is terrified she's right. Part of him crumples, defeated, absorbing her words. That part of him almost slinks back to his seat, letting her shape his reality, like she shaped his room—painting it in the right shade of blue. Arranging it to please her. Just so.

But just enough anger lingers to give him strength. Brandon draws the words from a store of strength he didn't know he had, but they fall from his lips with slow deliberation. "I might have to figure out a way to live with myself, but I sure as hell don't have to have dinner with you."

Brandon makes it to the door, and for the briefest moment he feels like he defeated something.

But he doesn't know what.

:::::::::::::::::::::::

The sense of control lasts until the door falls shuts behind him. Then he is powerless again, lost in the knowledge of his betrayal, trapped in his own silence.

Shame, shame, shame. It fills his lungs, floods through his veins. It thumps with every beat of his heart as he scales the mountainside. _You. Thump. Know. Thump. What. You. Thump. Did._ He sits across from Lou, and tries to drown himself in talk of music, but his band members won't let him.

_You. Thump. Know. Thump. What. You. Thump. Did._

They offer him a pot brownie instead.

Brandon hesitates, but the thought that it might actually make him feel free is too tempting to resist.

He takes a bite. When the drug kicks in, the world is cast in paranoid shadows, sending anxiety galloping wild. Brandon thought it might make him forget, but instead he feels trapped in his own mind. Words come at him from his band members, but it is all he can do to comprehend them through the haze of misery. Their laughter howls with the raucous timbre of hyenas.

"Here, have some water." Lou's exotic face swims into his vision. She looks strangely serious, for a hyena. "Let's play a game. I say a word, you say the first things it reminds you of."

After a long moment, comprehension hits. "Okay."

Salt, clouds; love and lust, sex and guilt.

It always comes back to guilt in the end.

Brandon stumbles away, and calls the safest person he can think of.

He just doesn't want to be alone anymore.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::

When the drug fades, Brandon wants to melt into the floor. Embarrassment is a palpable force, wrapping around him until his limbs feel weighted down by lead. He doesn't want to look her in the eye, but Lena doesn't let him collapse into himself. Her fingers grip his chin gently, until he can't shrink away from her soft, dark gaze. The compassion he sees there somehow both worsens the feeling inside him and comforts at once.

He can't believe he told her.

"You can't tell anyone what happened with Dani." The words fall from his lips, a command laced with something like terror. "You have to promise me."

"What Dani did to you isn't right." There's a fierceness, one that forbids dispute, to the quiet words. "It's _illegal_. And I can't—"

But Brandon can't, either. He can't have this conversation again. Lena is one thing—soft and giving, like a quilt, wrapping him in acceptance. But his dad and his mom are hot-tempered, edged with steel, showering everything with sparks when they collide.

He can't be responsible for another fallout.

But Lena, ruled by earthen solidity, will not be moved. "You can't ask me to do that."

"Please." The heat of trapped tears burns his eyelids, but none escape to grant him catharsis. "They'll never look at me the same way again."

They will see him for the terrible person he has become.

Reluctantly, Lena agrees to table the issue for now. Brandon knows it is only a temporary respite, but he clings to it with the strength of a drowning man. Resolutely, he turns up a pulsing rock song, so loud that it can almost smother the stubborn embers of his thoughts.

Almost.

But he still remembers the heaviness of Dani's soft body on top of him, and the strange way he enjoyed and hated her touch in the same breath.

Brandon shuts his eyes. If he loses himself in his music, it never happened. If he lies in bed, headphones blocking out the world, they will never have to know.

No one will ever have to know.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

Denial lasts through the next day, up until the moment he encounters lasagna.

It's cradled in Dani's arms like a small child, a gift for an ailing Lena. The rich smell, when Brandon steps into the Foster's kitchen, invites nausea.

Lasagna. His favorite, Dani knows.

It disgusts him, now. Because—under the savory sauce and the chewy pasta bursting with cheese—lurks another flavor, hard to spot, but present all the same. The first time she cooked for him, Brandon didn't even notice. But now he knows. Behind hints of rosemary and oregano lingers something rancid, long rotten.

Manipulation, it turns out, makes for poor seasoning.

It's the first time he's seen Dani with such clarity. The dish is a message for him, disguised as a thoughtful gesture for his mom. Brandon stops her from seeing Lena, not caring at his rudeness or his mother's startled rebuke.

Dani is every bit to blame as he is for all of this, and he won't let her get away with pretending otherwise. He abandons her in the kitchen to make her toxicity-laced salad, before she can say anything else to wound him.

For about five minutes, he feels vengefully satisfied to have foiled her.

Then Lena tells him.

"Your father is talking about having a baby with Dani."

A _baby_.

It sucks the breath from his lungs.

They can't hide from this any more.

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

"It's about Dani." The words break past Brandon's lips. He's trembling so hard that he has to clasp his hands together to maintain a semblance of composure. He is terribly cold, as though someone doused him in ice water, but somehow he is sweating all the same. Brandon is acutely conscious of Lena's form beside him, a support for him to draw upon in this torturous conversation.

Without her, this would be undoable.

Brandon struggles to make words. His mother's face shifts first, registering dawning horror. "Please tell me this isn't what I'm thinking."

It's a plea, but he cannot grant her absolution from what he has done. He meets her blue eyes and suddenly he can't speak.

"This is hard for him to talk about. Just give him a minute." Always the mediator, Lena sweeps to his rescue.

But his mom is not to be sidetracked. "Did Dani do something?"

The intensity of anxiety has tied his stomach in knots. Brandon wants to throw up, but not even words can make it past the dryness of his mouth.

"Brandon was in a vulnerable position—" Lena's soft voice rescues him, but it isn't enough.

"No, no, no." His father's interjection has the feel of a denial, but his eyes pierce into Brandon. "I want to hear it from him."

Brandon senses the dark emotion below the words. It might be anger, or betrayal—but somehow the demand loosens his tongue anyway.

The slow confession, when it comes, has all the feel of an exhumation, as though they have dragged a long-decomposing corpse into the light. The very air feels fetid, oily. Tainted.

But unlike Lena, his mom and dad don't take his story with merely a sharply inhaled breath. Instead, they erupt in tandem—twin volcanoes, plunging them all into magma and ash.

"Like he was so perfect when he was living with you—"

The words fall like a physical blow.

"_Stop_ it!" Desperate, Brandon intercedes. He wants to crawl out of his own skin, to cower away from the corruption inside of him that lead to all this vileness and conflict. "God, I never should have told you." His voice cracks in misery.

They call after him, but the longing to escape from himself is stronger than anything they could say.

:::::::::::::::

Brandon stares out the window, and tries to feel nothing at all.

"B?"

The quiet voice, the firm knock, signals the end of his solitude.

His mom steps into the room.

He can't look at her.

"I'm glad you told us." It's soft, gentle. He doesn't deserve it.

"I'm not."

"You understand that Dani was the adult in this situation."

Anger flashes without warning. "Uh-huh." It's clipped, the sort of voice that warns that the conversation is over.

But nothing about this entire day has been about what he wanted, so his mom keeps talking anyway.

"And that you're a minor."

"Yes." It drags out of him, resentful. His jaw is clenched so tight it hurts to move it.

But still she persists, soft, persuasive. Impossibly gentle.

"And that means what happened was illegal."

"_Mom_." Brandon wheels around, mobilized by the sheer force of his dismay. She can't possibly expect—

But she does, and her eyes are so sad that he is shaken. "You are the _victim _here, B."

"I'm not a victim."

"Honey…I handle a lot of these cases, and it's common that…the boys don't think they've been raped."

Her voice drops on the last word. Stricken.

_Raped_. It hits Brandon like a punch in the gut. "The difference is that I'm not one of your cases." It's illogical, a ridiculous protest, but Brandon has to make it.

Her breath hitches.

He has to prove it to her. He can't stand to have her sitting there, with grief he doesn't deserve shining through two blue eyes. "I was there! I know what I did."

She tries to dissuade him, but he clings to his responsibility with every scrap of stubbornness he possesses. He can't talk to the cops. He won't.

"This is completely humiliating."

He's not a victim. It was just a terrible choice. His terrible, shameful choice.

It _has_ to be.

It isn't until after his mother leaves the room that Brandon realizes he wants it to be.

::::::::::::::::

Brandon pours his confusion into piano keys, filtering suffering through sonatas. His numb fingers fumble the tune, so he switches to a slow melody. The ponderous notes sink the garage into gloom.

After all of Dani's dire warnings, he is nothing short of petrified when his dad finally enters. Brandon apologizes, struggling to release some of his endless store of regret. Reaching, hungrily, for absolution.

He half expects condemnation. But even his dad doesn't blame him.

_No matter how it started. What she did was illegal. We need to do something about it._

The calm, forceful support disarms him. Brandon's internal world is cast into chaos. If even his dad refuses to hold him accountable…

Maybe, just maybe, he wasn't.

The glimmer of hope lasts for no more than a heartbeat, but it's enough.

Brandon nods, an almost imperceptible jerk of the head, and lets his dad lead him into the plunge.

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**Short note**: Well, I binge-watched the Fosters last week, and became entirely addicted. So, please forgive me, any OCAS fans—I still haven't forgotten about you. I might write a little more for The Fosters first, but writing this made me realize how much I missed producing things for you guys. I'll be back before you know it. :) As for this story…**this is intended to be part 1 of 2**. (Possibly more, if the show inspires me.) This was an important turning point, but Brandon has a long way to go.

**Long, But Important Note:** When I first watched Adoption Day, I immediately grew angry with Dani, because as the adult she should have known better. But I also shook my head at what I saw as Brandon's bizarre choice to sleep with his father's girlfriend. Somehow, it didn't occur to me for several episodes to consider the events to be non-consensual. Even then, though I realized that it was statutory rape, and that Brandon's drunkenness and heartbreak made Dani's actions even more reprehensible, I still didn't really understand Brandon's internal environment. To me, the sex came almost completely out of left field; I had missed every single hint in the previous episodes. It seemed like his decision to kiss Dani was deliberate, and thus somewhat his responsibility, even if she should have stopped it before it went further.

Then I read a blog post, and suddenly my entire perspective flipped on its head. The problem was that I had exactly zero understanding of the ways sexual predators groom their victims. To my dismay, I realized that every interaction Dani had ever had with Brandon, from the instant they met, was textbook "grooming" behavior. Too much touching, too many secrets, too many adult references, making him in her debt in multiple ways, isolating him from his parents, making him feel like she was the only one who understood, controlling him with fear of Mike relapsing…the list goes on and on. She hadn't just taken advantage of a drunk, heart-broken, guilt-stricken sixteen-year-old (plenty bad enough)—she had been deliberately messing with his head and manipulating him towards this for months. He was terribly vulnerable towards her long before he took a sip of beer. But—like poor Brandon, who in The Longest Day can't even begin to explain why he slept with Dani—I hadn't understood any of that.

Unfortunately, from what I could tell, very few viewers seemed to grasp the sort of power Dani had over Brandon. That means that we wouldn't understand in real life. And we need to. So I wrote this.


End file.
